Took the ladyfriend to last night's game at the Juice Box. She improved her personal record at Cardinals games to 2-0, with the team scoring seventeen runs and allowing five. There were a lot of Cardinals fans in the stadium, many more than I remember being there when I went to games from 2004-06. We sat next to a nice man from Shreveport, LA who traded anecdotes with us for a few innings.
The nice thing was that we got a chance to sneak down to the second row of the field level around the seventh inning, and got a chance to watch the game from directly behind the Cardinals dugout. It was a great chance to just sit and be fans while these players that I had seen on TV for so long were literally just a few feet away. About five minutes after we sat down Yadi hit a line drive foul almost directly at our section, but we never had a chance at it, as the guy in front of made a pretty good barehand catch with his left hand. We got chatting with them a little bit, and they seemed a bit peeved with the proclivity of Cardinals fans in the stadium, but, then again, I had to remind them to do the Big-gi-o cheer when the Bigge took his at bat in the eighth, so I don't feel quite so guilty about having a bunch of my friends take over their house (and there was some gloating on the part of my brethren that I was less than enthused by). Also, they have a counter tracking Biggio's hit total, but none tracking the very real way in which the man is truly chasing history.
The lady friend, ever prone to excitement (and concerned about a perceived limp on his part), animatedly started waving at Jose Qquendo. Not to be rude, the Secret Weapon gave us a brief wave back, and eight year old me was back at the surface and completely aflutter. Chris Duncan gave the postgame interview directly in front of us.
Finally, we got a media guide from the FSN crew behind the dugout as we sat and watched the guys from the bullpen saunter into the dugout. Overall, it was just a wonderful night at the ballpark, even if the baseball was far more satisfying than it was compelling as we watched the team finally declare, with authority, that they are no longer a losing team, at least for one night.
Update [2007-8-29 13:55:40 by Valatan]:: Derek Goold makes an interesting statistical argument in favor of Albert for MVP this season, even without tacking on the fact that his September is likely going to further dilute his April.